No one dares move. The silence that sits on the chest of the panic-stricken family - a deadweight as the now far too exposed teenager fights for air in the corner. Tears sting her eyes and she chokes as she meets the menace of each of her conservative ex-family. Would they take her in now? They couldn't. They wouldn't.
Her being is a line drawn in the sand. Her family remains firmly planted on one side. The girl stands alone on the other, legs trembling under the weight of her decision and stomach rolling as hard as the waves of a new life that lap behind her. This side of the line is thick and humid. The girl draws another breath as they wait in utter silence. Who will be the first to say the word? The wretched, heart-wrenching, disgusting word. She heard her family use those painful words all the time.
That one word would start a war. She didn't want to fight her family like this. A conflict as such would rip them to pieces. Fighting wasn't the good option. Not like that. Maybe, just maybe, it would be necessary. Maybe, just maybe, their fighting would get the now beat-red faced, furrowed brow, aching strangers that sit in front of her to listen, to understand, to accept, to love.
No. There's a better way to do this. She doesn't have to suffer like this. She doesn't have to suffer not knowing what happens to the family that left her behind. She doesn't have to be left behind. Maybe just bring the, a little closer to her line in the sand.
"I hope you still love me." She doesn't register the words leaving her mouth until they slice through the suffocating silence.
The middle-aged woman with soft, wrinkled features meets her gaze. Tears sting in her eyes as she takes in a sharp breath, "okay."
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